Once self-copying memes had arisen, their own, much faster, kind of evolution took off. – Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene

Dominic Basulto imagines that digital devices are a kind of primordial soup in which “digital bits” of Big Data will propagate to the point where “they don’t need us anymore.” He speculates upon Richard Dawkins’ theory of memes:

Where things become both exciting and creepy is if the data replicators (data memes) become truly “selfish” and start to challenge the classic genetic replicators (genes). It’s not just that Big Data wants to become Bigger, it’s that it may eventually want to out-compete our genetic material.http://bigthink.com/endless-innovation/big-data-the-new-replicators

Pain is a difficult thing to think about. Nobody really wants to. We just want to forget about it. Yet, we are fascinated by pain. It strikes a chord within us and we so often find ourselves putting on the brakes to catch a glimpse of it while passing a car accident. We wonder, “Is anybody hurt?”

Pain is linked to everything that is “wrong” in our lives. We try to avoid it, yet it always creeps in. We hate it the most when it presents itself for no reason at all. It is not fair.

Pain is an uninvited guest. It enters our bodies and pesters us. It pokes, prods, and sometimes goes so far as to push us down on the ground. Why? We scream for it to get out, but it comes back relentlessly. What does it want?